Pakistan ODI Team Without Babar Azam, Fakhar Zaman, Saim Ayub and Saud Shakeel — The Lost Stars
Pakistan sent a squad to Bangladesh in March 2026 without Babar Azam, Fakhar Zaman, Saim Ayub, and Saud Shakeel. Six uncapped players walked in. Their entire batting spine walked out.
Mike Hesson called it a development opportunity. Fine. But someone should remind him that an ODI has 50 overs, not 15. You do not drop a bunch all together, hand six debutants an overseas series, and dress it up as a plan.
I have watched Pakistan cricket through enough cycles to know what this looks like. It is not a rebuild. It is a reaction. For sure Pakistan ODI Team Without Babar Azam is incomplete.
Why Dropping All Four Together Is Different
There is a difference between rotating your squad and removing your batting identity in one selection meeting.
Each of these four names serves a different role in Pakistan’s 50-over setup. Together, they cover everything from explosive opening to rock-solid middle order. Drop one and you create a gap. Drop all four and you create a vacuum.
That vacuum is now walking into Dhaka.
Twenty ODI centuries. Equal to Saeed Anwar’s Pakistan all-time record. An average above 54 across 140 matches. Under his captaincy, Pakistan reached number one in the ICC ODI rankings in 2023 for the first time in 33 years.
This is not a player you drop lightly.
But cricket moves fast. And Babar, for the first time in his career, stopped moving with it.
The T20 Problem That Spilled Into ODIs
His powerplay strike rate in T20 World Cups dropped below 100. In a format where 140 is baseline at the top of the order, that number is terminal.
Then came the BBL season of 2025-26. He scored 202 runs in 11 innings at a strike rate of 103. Three sixes in an entire Big Bash season. A player clearly fighting to rediscover something he had always done naturally.
He never found it.
What Hesson and Agha Said Publicly
Before Pakistan’s Super 8 match against New Zealand at the T20 World Cup 2026, Hesson was direct in a press conference.
“Babar is well aware that his strike rate in the powerplay in World Cups is less than 100,” he said. He also confirmed that number four was now Babar’s T20 slot. “At the 12th over mark, Babar Azam is not the best person to come in. We have plenty of other options.”
T20 captain Salman Ali Agha went further. He confirmed Babar had a defined role and that selections would go to whoever was best for the team. He did not rule out dropping him if the strike rate did not improve.
Two senior figures. One player. Very public statements. Whatever the intention, it landed as a demotion.
Lost His Natural Game Chasing Someone Else’s
This is the part that makes the Babar Azam story genuinely sad for those who watched him at his best.
He was never built to smash. He was built to accumulate, rotate, accelerate. In ODIs, that works perfectly. His 54 average across 140 matches proves it. But the T20 pressure to be something he is not changed how he played, even in formats where his natural game was working fine.
The BBL experiment showed a batter pressing for sixes he does not need to hit. Playing at a strike rate that does not match who he actually is. He lost the cover drive timing that made him number one. He lost the judgment at the crease that separated him from everyone else.
When you try to bat like someone else, you stop batting like yourself.
Where He Actually Fits: The Position Debate
Babar built his career opening or at number three. That is where his game belongs. Patience at the start, pressure in the middle, a platform for those around him.
In ODIs, that profile is valuable. His numbers prove it.
The T20 demand for powerplay aggression pushed him to four. Then to a reserve role. Then to sitting padded up against Namibia in a World Cup group stage match and never facing a delivery.
That image is all you need to understand how badly the relationship between player and management broke down.
Fakhar Zaman and Saim Ayub: Two Different Situations, Same Outcome
Fakhar Zaman
Pakistan’s first ODI double centurion. His 193 chasing in South Africa ended in defeat but remains one of the most watched innings in Pakistan ODI history. He carried the 2017 Champions Trophy final almost single-handedly.
His Bangladesh absence is injury. A hamstring problem from the T20 World Cup kept him home. Clean reason, no debate there.
But the question Pakistan need to answer honestly is how many ODI cycles Fakhar has left. He has always been injury-prone. When fit, he is a match-winner. When he is not, Pakistan’s top order loses its most dangerous option.
Saim Ayub
Three hundreds in 17 ODIs. At 23 years old. Including a match-winning century that sealed Pakistan’s first-ever ODI series whitewash in South Africa.
He had a quiet T20 World Cup. So did several others. The difference is that Saim’s ODI numbers demand continued faith, not a simultaneous exit with three senior names.
If Pakistan are serious about life after Fakhar and Babar, Saim Ayub is central to it. Dropping him alongside everyone else makes no sense as a development policy.
Six Uncapped Players in Dhaka: Too Much, All Together
Sahibzada Farhan earned his chance. He broke run-scoring records at the T20 World Cup 2026. Shamyl Hussain topped domestic first-class charts. These are not random picks.
But six uncapped players in one overseas ODI series, with no established batting anchor in the top four, is not a structured transition.
Young players develop best alongside experienced ones. A dressing room without senior batters becomes a guessing game for everyone. The youngsters have nobody to watch, nobody to learn from in the middle, nobody to anchor an innings when conditions turn difficult.
Watch Pakistan vs Bangladesh first ODI highlights today.
That is the contradiction at the heart of this squad. Hesson wants youth to grow. But he removed the environment where growth actually happens.
The Pattern Pakistan Cannot Break
This is not one bad squad selection. It is the same cycle repeating.
Poor result. Multiple changes. New setup struggles. More changes. No single thread running through the rebuild because nobody has agreed on what Pakistan’s ODI identity should look like heading into the next World Cup.
Do they want aggressive openers? A Babar-type anchor? A deep batting lineup with all-rounders finishing? Until that decision is made clearly, every squad will look like it was chosen in isolation from the one before.
The plan has to come before the squad. Not the other way around.
FAQs
Q1: Why was Babar Azam dropped from the Pakistan ODI squad for Bangladesh
Following Pakistan’s T20 World Cup 2026 exit, the selectors used the Bangladesh series to look at younger talent. It is the first time in his career that Babar has been excluded from a Pakistan ODI squad.
Q2: What is Babar Azam’s record as ODI captain?
He won 26 of 43 ODI matches as captain. Across all formats, he led Pakistan in 148 matches, winning 84 at a win percentage of around 57 percent.
Q3: Why is Fakhar Zaman not in the Bangladesh ODI squad?
He sustained a hamstring injury during the T20 World Cup 2026 and was unavailable to travel. His absence is injury-related.
Q4: What did Mike Hesson say about Babar Azam? Hesson confirmed publicly that Babar’s powerplay strike rate in T20 World Cups was below 100 and that he was no longer the best option during the middle overs of a T20 innings.
Q5: How many ODI centuries has Babar Azam scored?
Twenty, which equals Saeed Anwar’s Pakistan all-time record in ODIs.
Q6: Will Babar Azam return to Pakistan’s ODI team?
Given his average of 54 across 140 ODIs, permanent exclusion seems unlikely. But the current management has made clear that strike rate improvements need to follow before automatic recall.
Pakistan cricket has done this before. The reset. The fresh start. The wave of new names that quietly disappears when results do not come fast enough.
Babar Azam’s ODI numbers remain elite. Fakhar Zaman is still dangerous when fit. Saim Ayub has three ODI hundreds before his 24th birthday. These are not finished cricketers.
The real question was never whether to include youth. That answer is always yes. The question is whether Pakistan’s management has the patience to build something that lasts longer than a single selection cycle.
Right now, the answer to that is still unclear.
— Umair Hussain, Khelo Pakistan
